CategoryMedical Myths Archives - Knope Clinic

During the last installment of The Pearl, I wrote about the great social discovery of our time – the realization that you can change your gender like a pair of Nikes. We need no longer feel bound by our X or Y chromosomes. The double-helix is dead and DNA is irrelevant. In their place is Governor Moonbeam, broadcasting new-age wisdom from his intellectual death star on the planet California. In this new era of pick-your-own-gender, Moonbeam has been waging war on biology and science.… Read the rest

For those of you who have read my previous blogs, you are familiar with my stance on vitamins, supplements, and “alternative medicine.” Though this topic is an entertaining example of human folly, taking untested supplements carries some real risks. Unlike the act of believing in Santa Claus, believing in untested substances is far from harmless. When you go down this path you are ingesting compounds that quite literally alter your body chemistry.

Speaking of Santa Claus and alternative medicine, for those of you who are new to my philosophy, I direct you to a short video in which I went toe-to-toe in a televised debate with Santa himself – none other than Dr.… Read the rest

For those of us who grew up in the Midwest, this was a question that virtually all children heard from their mothers at one time or another. Seemingly rhetorical, the question was meant to convey the message that there must be something seriously wrong with any young boy who would put his sister’s Barbie doll in the garbage disposal and then flip the switch. Of course, young boys exhibit such inexplicable behavior on a regular basis.… Read the rest

There are few topics that create more confusion among people than the question of whether or not to take an aspirin every day to prevent a heart attack. If you do take an aspirin, what is the best dose? Should you take a full 325 mg adult aspirin tablet or an 81 mg baby aspirin? Should you perhaps compromise and just lick an aspirin tablet every day?

The truth is that the correct answers to these questions are still evolving.… Read the rest

Many of you have read recent press reports regarding a study that concluded that the commonly used antibiotic called azithromycin, the “Z-Pak”, is associated with an increase in cardiovascular death. Ouch! Really? Since this study was published in the New England Journal of Medicine, it is probably worth a closer look.

Expert Opinion: The traditional method used by the press to address a controversial question like this is to trot out a celebrity doctor, like Dr.… Read the rest

For those of you who have read my book, Concierge Medicine, you will recall that I talk about health as an asset. To be more precise, your health should be viewed as your most precious asset – something that needs constant attention, just like your financial portfolio.

In performing “health valuations,” I focus on two critical areas; a person’s body weight (or body composition) and their level of fitness. These two metrics tell me a lot about how your body is able to perform and how it will serve you in your retirement.… Read the rest

Many of you have read about the recent controversial statement from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force that ordering a PSA as a screening test for prostate cancer is a bad idea. The Task Force recommendation was so strong that it was given a D-rating, which means the Task Force believes that there is moderate or high certainty that PSA testing has no net benefit or that the harms of testing outweighs the benefits.

This statement has created a strong backlash from some urologists.… Read the rest

“Early to bed, early to rise, take multivitamins and you’re more likely to die.”

Okay, so I changed this old chestnut a bit to get your attention. However, as many of you have now read, a recently published study in the Archives of Internal Medicine showed that adult women who took multivitamins had a higher mortality rate than those who did not. Before you conclude that this finding was unrelated to the vitamins, consider this: The women who took vitamins were healthier to start with than those women who did not take vitamins.… Read the rest